Dennis Nett/The Post-StandardCicero Police Officer Mike Serafin shops with Abby Cerio and Emily Flood, both 11, of Cicero. The Cicero Police Benevolent Association and Cicero Police Department hosted a "Shop with Cop" event this morning at the Target in Cicero. Cerio, Flood and eight other children who live in the town were selected to participate based on a letter they wrote about what Christmas and the holidays mean to them, and why they would like to shop with a cop. All 10 children received a $100 gift card, donated by the Cicero PBA and Target. To read the letters, go to http://blog.syracuse.com/indepth. Cicero, NY - Abby Ainsworth remembered what Christmas was all about when she went shopping on Sunday.

“Christmas to me is not about the gifts,” said Ainsworth, 8. “It’s about giving and sharing.”

She wrote a letter to Cicero police explaining that there are a lot of children who don’t have as much as she does.

“Some don’t even have a warm coat so I have been collecting coats for them and my papa has been cleaning them so they look nice,” she wrote in her letter.

Ainsworth was one of 10 children chosen to participate in a “Shop with a Cop” event Sunday at Target in Cicero. Cicero police officers asked the children to write handwritten letters telling them what the holidays mean to them. The winners were each given a $100 gift card, donated by the Cicero Police Benevolent Association and Target.

Ainsworth said she used her gift card to buy about 25 hats and 25 pairs of gloves to match the 160 used coats she’s been collecting. She plans to give them to students at Seymour Magnet School in Syracuse. Her grandfather, Jim Giaquint cleans the coats at a Syracuse dry cleaning store he owns.

“It makes me feel really good because I get to give them to the people who don’t have them and now they can stay very warm,” said Ainsworth, a third-grader at Lakeshore Road Elementary School in Cicero.

Cicero police Officer John Cottrell said the 10 children seemed to have a better grasp of the holidays than most adults.

“I’m glad to see there are children who know what the spirit of Christmas and the holidays are all about,” he said.

This was the second year Cicero police officers took children shopping through the “Shop with a Cop” program.